Aviation News Item: 00480

5th Aug 2009

Source: ubmaviationnews.com

Deutsche Flugsicherung (DFS), Germany's air traffic control (ATC) provider, has suspended four ATC employees from further work on the control tower of the country's main hub. This follows a near-miss incident at Frankfurt International airport on July 18, 2009. Around 2.00am local time (24.00 UTC) during the night of July 17/18, 2009, a Cessna 425 wrongly took off from a taxiway that runs parallel in-between the two runways. This happened without ATC clearance, and DFS has not said why the pilot took off from the taxiway. On climb out, the turboprop narrowly missed a 737 that was standing on the taxiway for an engine run-up test and had technicians on board. The tower crew did not notice the incident until they were informed by the Cessna pilot. A subsequent DFS-internal investigation, which was concluded last week, revealed that three controllers and one employee who processes flight data were temporarily not in their positions. The German aircraft accident investigation bureau, BFU, has been notified of the incident.

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